Candidate running for PP presidency compares Catalan leaders and terrorist group ETA

One of the leading contestants to the presidency of the People's Party in Spain, former Defence minister María Dolores de Cospedal, compared on Saturday Catalan pro-independence leaders to Basque terrorist group ETA.

De Cospedal chose Barcelona to start her campaign to lead the PP after former president Mariano Rajoy's resignation.

"If ETA did not manage to break up Spain, this great nation and the unity of our country, it is obvious Puigdemont and Torra won't achieve it either," said De Cospedal, referring to the former and current presidents of Catalonia.

De Cospedal said that, as minister, she would have preferred to suspend Catalonia's self-rule "earlier."

The last Spanish government, in agreement with the Socialist party and Ciudadanos, applied Article 155 of the Constitution and took control over Catalonia's administration after Parliament declared independence, on October 27, 2017.

According to Cospedal, this should had happened before, and public media should had been intervened as well. Cospedal described TV3, the Catalan public television channel, as a "propaganda apparatus."

Catalonia was under Spain's rule for over seven months, until a new government led by Quim Torra was elected.

Cospedal promised that, if she becomes the leader of the Spanish PP, she will make sure that "no trick by anyone would allow Catalonia to separate from the rest of Spain."